Dear Myself
by JPLE
Summary: Marauder Era - 7th year. Professor McGonagall sets a 'goal setting' task for the class of 1978; each student must write a letter to their thirty year old self. 8 chapters of 8 students. LE/JP, SB/RL.
1. Remus

**Disclaimer: **J.K Rowling owns it and I do not.

**Summary: **Professor McGonagall sets a 'goal setting' task for the class of 1978; each student must write a letter to their thirty year old self outlining their career, career goals and lifestyle.

The letters written are somewhat different to what she expected, so thank goodness this assignment was never handed in...

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**REMUS**

Dear Remus,

Will I remember writing this? Of course not.

I'm pretty sure I'll remember thinking I was superior to everyone else in the cohort doing this task, because I was the most realistic and didn't consider myself to become a famous quidditch player or auror by the time I find this letter.

I'll remember sincerely wishing McGonagall didn't set this task; because it is incredibly mundane and frankly, my future is not going to look any different from my present.

I feel like apologising to you, thirty-year-old Remus John Lupin, because I'm pretty certain I'm still going to be the same old tag along, with the same unemployed status, with the same aspirations (however big of a pipe dream it is) and the same old 'furry problem.'

But I have one consolation; I hope that my friends will still have stuck by me, despite my worthlessness in a world which cannot accept me for who I am – who I will still be.

I'll remember that I wrote this with my friends in mind; because they're the only thing I look forward to in the future. My only future; because they are the most important things in the world to me.

I bet thirty year old R. is laughing at my depressing writing right now, and picking up grammatical errors on the way.

My friends. Prongs, Wormtail, Padfoot...and maybe even Evans.

James will surely stay the same.

The same old James; with a moderately-large ego and a colossal crush on Lily Evans (or will it be Potter by the time this is read?). Prongs; the scheming, witty, light-hearted but fiercely loyal James, who would do anything for his friends. What I wouldn't give to be him.

Prongs that is so lucky, it is sometimes hard to be civil towards him. Everything he wants he gets, on a silver platter no less. He'll still be that rich pureblood (albeit talented), with the world at his feet. Not that it means a thing to him; he prefers to follow Lily around, practically stalking her wherever she goes.

That's one of the things I like about James. He doesn't give a damn about some things.

It might be easy to be jealous of him, but the way he handles the fuss, with such ease and charm, and puts everything into real perspective, is admirable. One day, when I read this, I'll probably remember Prongs as the least serious of the lot; the one with the least to lose, the one with the most to gain. But I will be wrong.

He is serious; he's serious about fighting, about his friends, his Lily. I doubt that Lily would ever bring herself to admit that she is his, (she was always his). However the pure, impervious love he has for her, even though it is not always evident, is overwhelming.

I'll remember telling myself to trust myself on this one fact; I've experienced the pains of the Lily-induced trauma which still affects the disgustingly lovesick adolescent. It really is a blessing on all of us that Lily finally succumbed to his endless harassment.

He is serious about his friends; including me.

The sacrifices he makes for me, which they all make for me, are far beyond the confines of any normal friendship.

Then there is Wormtail. I'll remember him as my companion, the one who secretly and shamelessly boosts my ego, my confident when Padfoot and Prongs go home together for the summer and temporarily forget about us for three months.

I'll remember Wormtail always being so trustworthy, so predictable and stable; that's why I can't bring myself to ever disregard him as one of my closest friends, despite his highly strung nature which had the ability to frankly piss me off.

I'll remember all those times I almost killed Wormtail accidently in wolf form; stepping on him or snapping at him with razor sharp fangs. Of course; I never **really** remember these, but it never makes me feel any better in the morning when James and Sirius fill me in on his absence.

Pete is always a little easily convinced, I have no doubt he is a bit of a wuss, which always troubles me as to why he was sorted into Gryffindor. I will probably still hope that this lack of bravery is made up in loyalty. He has never given me any reason to doubt him.

Evans has only just become my friend.

I'll remember her as the fiery redhead with a sharp tongue and a hopeless crush on Prongs. Her stubbornness is the source of so much angst for me, as Prongs' unlucky friend.

I'll probably recall wondering for so long why love can't simply be an exchange of those three little words and be done with it.

Perhaps a good snog.

But then what would I know about love? I probably still have no clue. Because that is my **other** secret, and it's currently eating away at me. Tell me what to do thirty-year-old-Remus.

Padfoot. Sirius. Black.

Gregarious, flirtatious, witty and loveable.

Everything I wish I could be, and everything I probably will still want.

I'll probably remember this as my 'little secret' (in comparison to the life-changing, scary secret) or my dance with the other side.

It happened very slowly, and almost unnoticeably, the little shift from brothers to...to what I'm still unsure.

It began with a night of fire whisky and dares in one of Hogwarts' unscheduled Hogesmeade visits when, in the middle of a very inappropriate discussion, I swear, he winked slyly at me, and I remember not feeling exasperated.

But I pushed it aside because I must have imagined it.

It followed when I was on a camping trip with the marauders and I watched the three of them play in the cold water which I was completely against approaching. Watching with admiration at James' swimming ability, laughing at Wormtail's incompetence, and staring, shamelessly staring at the boy with shoulder length dark hair and grey eyes, which lit up as the droplets of water splashed all over his face.

But I pushed it aside because I must have just been staring into space.

It came back to me when he carelessly draped an arm over me at the Ravenclaw/Gryffindor quidditch match, and it felt warm and comfortable, to the extent where I wished I could just melt into him and become one.

But I pushed it aside because I must have just been tired.

It haunted me when I began dreaming about him, everything about him, and waking up to find myself utterly confused. He, James and Wormtail snickered at me for moaning in my sleep so I began casting a silencing charm over my bed every night. It would be embarrassing to murmur his name.

It became impossible when I began to dream about me and him; together.

But I pushed it aside because it was probably a phase.

It intensified when he tackled me to the ground when he thought I had stolen his cologne and our faces were inches away from each other. I inhaled sharply, and breathed in the tension.

But I pushed it aside because it was just brotherly love.

It became unbearable when he yelled at me for being the object of Marlene McKinnon's affections. I'll remember being ropable after he decided to 'get back at Remus' by making out with Athaliah di Penates, and thinking it was a strange way of retaliating against claims that I was merely 'ditching the Marauders.' Now I think about it, it could have been...

But I pushed it aside because he was just worried about the Marauders splitting up.

It became impossible to ignore however, when I saw him, beyond drunk, at the quidditch cup after party (insert comment from James about how brilliant his chasing is) and he approached me, brilliant and beautiful as he was absolutely hammered, and threw his long arms around my neck. I'll remember the feeling of shock I had, the fact that everyone else in the room but James was oblivious, the way I saw Prongs' eyes flash, as if he had just solved a complicated algorithm.

I'll recall, vividly, the way he collapsed into my arms, his still clinging around my neck, his face warm against my cheek as he hugged me tightly. I'll still shudder when I remember the way he whispered 'Moony' into my ear and innocently pressed his mouth into the place where my shoulder and neck met, onto the strip of skin, uncovered by my t-shirt.

I'll regret the fact that I stepped away, holding him upright with my arms and leading him over to a couch to make sure that he didn't fall asleep where he stood.

That time I couldn't push away that nagging feeling. Perhaps I still can't.

Dear thirty year old Remus. Wake up to yourself; you've fallen for your best friend.

Sincerely,

Remus J. Lupin. Aka. Moony.


	2. James

_**A/N: **_

I know that I'm progressing through this story quickly, but there's something I just wanted to address.  
If you read this story; please review. I got so many story alerts in just under 24 hours but only one review!  
I'm not asking for them because I want to look like a good writer, I just want some honest feedback from my readers.  
It would help this story progress a lot quicker trust me!

So if you liked it (which I presume at least some of you did; I can't imagine why you would subscribe to the story otherwise), tell me what it was that you liked.  
If you couldnt read past the first line, tell me why it abhorred you so much.  
Honest critics make the best readers so please drop me a line!

Additionally, if you read, please let me know which character you would like me to write for the next installment!

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James

Evans, Evans, Evans.

Lily, Lily, Lily.

Now that I have successfully gotten that out of the way, I should be able to create some kind of half-assed attempt at Minnie's boring little project. Sorry Minnie. It's thrilling, really.

Why, thirty year old James Potter may ask, is it necessary to rewrite Lily's name over and over again when she is clearly now your wife with forty seven of your offspring?

That is going to take a long time to answer. It shouldn't, because it's very clear to everyone that she wants to bear your children and be around you every second of the day to gaze upon your ridiculous good looks and bask in your calming aura, but little red sometimes takes a while to understand and fully appreciate these things.

I hope to god that Lily never reads this because in all honesty, my good looks and irresistible charm don't seem to work too well on her, and it's only taken me six years and two months to get her to even come within a ten foot radius for purposes other than hitting, slapping, punching or generally abusing. Fortunately for me, Lily is now my girlfriend. I can't seem to say it enough.

Lily Evans is my girlfriend.

If Sirius ever read this either he would throw me onto the ground and pummel me for being such a girl. Let's hope he never does.

I'm beginning to think, thirty year old James Potter, that this is becoming a highly top secret document. Minnie you better not read this out in class.

I know you specifically told me not to call you Minnie but I just can't resist. See now that I have divulged the bulk of my day to day thoughts and secrets I think we've advanced to the next level of confidence in which I can refer to you as something other than Professor McGonagall. Really, Minnie it makes you sound so much older than you are. Take it from someone as young and exuberant as me.

So where was I? Oh, Evans.

Well Evans is, as you can probably recall from just looking over in her direction as she cooks up some kind of amazing dinner for you, very shag-worthy.

I think she would rather me refer to her as 'beautiful' or 'stunning' or 'gorgeous', but some things just can't be explained that way. Of course, she is beautiful and stunning and gorgeous but that doesn't explain what makes me tick, or makes this little place above my navel lurch when she gives me 'bedroom eyes.'

She says that it's called a glare, something she does when she's royally pissed off, but I know what it really means. Some things probably haven't changed.

There's something I really want to ask you, older, wiser, experienced thirty-year-old-James Potter. How is Evans in the sack?

I mean, it's not like I'm desperate to get her panties off, but let's just remember I am a fully hormonal, testosterone pumping male here. I need to know these things. If Evan's doesn't shag me for another decade I'll be fine with that, but imagining it is just not quite the same and...

Sorry Minnie.

So anyway; my future.

I wish I could be an auror, and I hope thirty-year-old-James Potter is, but Evan's really wants to be a healer and I would do anything to be near her all the time. Not to mention that I will probably have to find a very long stick to hit all her admiring jerks of co-workers off if I don't.

Lily will be the death of me, I can just see it. Which is ironic because I'm not a seer, I don't have the gift of sight as Professor Anblick, the divination teacher, would say, in her huskiest voice.

I just love Lily that much.

Again, Sirius would kill me for that sentiment but it's only true; I love Lily Evans.

Lily would probably tell me that those words are far too strong to describe a four month long relationship, but she doesn't quite get it. You see, no matter how smart Evans may be when it comes to schoolwork, she can't master anything they don't teach you in a book.

This is why Lily still can't quite comprehend, despite her intelligence, that I have loved her for far longer than she believes. She believes that prior to our relationship I was dating other girls because I liked them, not just to make her jealous.

I thought it was extraordinarily obvious. Moony disagreed with me, but he's always being so logical it would be plausible to think that he was a girl as well.

Oh and that leads into another perfect theory by James Potter. Which means it is one hundred percent correct and not even worth theorizing over.

Sirius and Moony want to fuck each other.

Now you may say in thirty years' time (if they are not screwing each others' brains out by then), that this theory is completely implausible.

But it's not. It's perfect. Sirius and Moony. My best friends. Oh and Pete, sorry Pete.

I hope Pete doesn't read this.

List of people not allowed to read this letter:

Lily

Sirius

Remus

Pete

Minnie

Seriously, stop reading now Minnie.

I would reiterate this to Evans too, if she read this because sometimes her curiosity gets the better of her and she disregards things I say just to get to the bottom of things. This in itself is curious because I'm fairly certain she didn't read 'How to be a busy body' either.

This is how Lily found out about Remus' little secret; by spying.

It was awfully adorable how she stuttered over her words when we found her, concealed by a (might I add incredibly difficult) disillusionment charm, but she forgot it wasn't sound proof and made the little 'oh' gasping noise when I knocked into her.

Of course Sirius wanted to kill her right then and there, Peter just looked like he had swallowed a dungbomb and Remus looked like he wanted to shrivel up into a hole and stay there until he died like a dried out prune. But I thought she looked gorgeous.

Lily's apologetic look is one of my favourites. This is because I am rarely ever on the receiving end of it. Apparently it is impossible for a girl to do wrong in a relationship, and only too easy for a male to do the same.

Bloody girls.

Sorry Lily.

Lily, stop reading!

Sorry thirty-year-old James, that was just a precaution.

I hope you and Lily have heaps of kids. Little ones with black hair and green eyes and play quidditch before they can walk. Lily probably doesn't want that but really, what's going to stop them?

I don't really like little kids I'll be honest. Lily says this is because I have the maturity of a five year old myself, but I'm so sure that I'll like Lily's kids; our kids.

I can just imagine Sirius sending a stinging hex right at my male parts as I wrote that. He wouldn't apologise either because he would say it was evident through those last three sentences that I lacked any male parts at all.

It is with that epiphany that I notice this whole letter is about Lily. Evidently my 'desensitisation' at the top of the page didn't do nearly as much as I hoped it would.

Never mind, I'm sure, Minnie, you greatly appreciate my work of literary genius regardless. Except that you are not supposed to be reading this far down as I told you to stop almost a page ago.

Sorry thirty-year-old James, it's not my fault everyone finds you so irresistibly interesting.

Until then,

James. H. Potter.


	3. Marlene

_**A/N:**_

Thank you so much to all that reviewed, if I have not already pm'd you to thank you for your support, I would like to extend that to you now!  
A lot of you called for Sirius, and I really wanted to write him too, but I had an epiphany and want to save him for the last chapter (unless that is completely unacceptable by you all) because I think it would really work out well (it does in my head at least).

For your patience I threw in a fair slab of RL/SB fluff for all of you :)

On another note, sorry for the late update. I wrote this on Sunday night but the stories page is experiencing some kind of technical difficulty and I couldnt update until now.

Enjoy, and please let me know what you think!

**Marlene**

Dear Marlene,

I sincerely hope you are a lot more motivated, successful in love and generally better at life at thirty than you are currently. I didn't set out for this letter to become a forum for generally bitching and moaning about your life, but I can't help it right now.

Especially on the love/lust front; you're going to get more complaints from me than a first year experiencing their first pimple.

Let's get onto this shall we?

I don't feel like I have to hide anything here; I trust McGonagall not to read it; Lily assures me she won't (and to be completely honest I trust every world Lily speaks – she is my best friend), and if she did she would put it down immediately on the discovery of my assumption that she would not.

Anyway, I probably won't even get around to submitting this; I'm just that much of a hopeless loser. It's all his fault.

Stupid him. I call him that because I forbade myself to speak his name (Alice told me to make the unbreakable vow - she was that sick of hearing it; Lily said it was the most 'reckless and stupid idea thought up by anyone who was not James Potter').

I told myself that I would not mention him at all until he realized I was perfect for him in every single way. We're complete opposites, but opposites attract right?

(Lily, incidentally, says this is a complete myth, however since she is dating James Potter I am obliged to ignore that comment).

He's humble and quiet and a little scarred to be honest. Marlene McKinnon is, or at least used to be, loquacious (Lily's word of the day), stubborn and unfortunately, a bit stuck up.

There's one more very minute, insignificant difference between us.

I'm straight, and he's, well...he's not. That is, at least, in my opinion.

(That is to say Lily doesn't believe it – yet. Anyone could tell you that Lily is fairly ignorant to anything that a book cannot teach).

I should have realised it well before this point, I certainly would have if it were not for my upmost confidence in securing a boyfriend, and my attraction to him, which was quite unlike anything else I've experienced.

Even Amos Diggory didn't have my stomach doing flips as violently as he did.

It wasn't until I had notified a few select people of my attraction to this marvellous creature, that I realised I had been so blind.

I, Marlene McKinnon, will be the first to admit that I am not, or at least was not, the most modest of all Hogwarts students. I get reprimanded every transfiguration lesson for wearing my school skirt inches above the knee and leered at by creepy Slytherins for my voluptuous figure. But he never looked at me anywhere other than my face.

I noticed that my hair flicks, flirtatious conversations and consistent batting eyelids could not even raise a smirk on his slightly disfigured face. Nor, when I was particularly brave and slightly brushed my hand over his arm, did he relax his serious facade or seem even a little taken aback. He laughed at all my jokes half-heartedly and smiled at my stories like a good friend would, but he was never engaged in them like a guy interested in getting into my pants.

At first I told myself that it was because he was a decent male, and that most males were not decent. But then I began to accept that perhaps it wasn't me he was chasing.

Was it another girl? I presumed it to be. I was a little offended at first to tell the truth; I'm an extremely difficult catch (insert Lily's comment about an out of control ego) which any guy around here would jump at.

Then I realised that his eyes went elsewhere.

He loved his friends, everyone knew he did. They were a very close knit bunch. I don't think anyone would have guessed how close. Perhaps no one still knows.

It's the seventies now, after all, society is progressing at a break-neck rate with these kinds of issues, but homosexuality is not something that people tend to shout from the rooftops. That kind of suppression is probably what's got Voldy's knickers in such a twist. If he had just gone with the flow maybe none of this crap would be happening. (Lily says it's incredibly insensitive to call He Who Must Not Be Named 'Voldy' but really; if you're planning on fighting him, you've got to reduce the enemy to smithereens with verbal insults first).

So despite the fact that I wished my presence would make him happy, it seemed to deflate him a little, and his friend, who may be more than a friend, would storm around stony faced and angry. At first I thought it was because Sirius didn't like me as a person, that he didn't approve of me as a suitable girlfriend (which, to be honest, I felt fairly miffed at). But now I think about it, it may have been caused by other emotions entirely.

Of course, they could both still be lying to themselves, and each other, but I, and perhaps only I, can see what's really going on beneath the surface.

He, the boy who, for reasons akin to Voldy's evilness, cannot be named, loves his best friend.

In herbology the other day they potted mandrakes together, and out of the corner of my eye (or as Lily would say, whilst shamelessly stalking), I saw Sirius' hand brush his, and saw him shudder slightly, as if an electric current had just sparked him.

My stomach flipped violently, and it wasn't because I was in love.

I was jealous. Amos could never make me feel like that (to be blatantly honest he was rather boring).

Lily, Alice and I always pass the four boys sitting around the common room table, doing homework or playing chess. Lily and James immediately either pull the other aside to snog each other's brains out or engage in scary, and almost always loud, arguments. Meanwhile, Alice runs off to find Frank and I'm left with a depressed minion and two individuals enjoying the perks of repressed homosexuality. It's always such an enjoyable experience.

During these moments of awkward, static and completely unnecessary contact, Sirius shoots him glares if he even so much as lifts his head in my direction, but otherwise secretly and silently, engages in a ravenous version of eye sex. Alternatively he uses Peter as a distracting mechanism on me while he rolls around, play fighting, with him on the floor, touching a lot more than is really necessary in a game between friends.

Peter is more of a bore than Amos, despite the fact that I feel rather sorry for him (As Lily says, 'he will always be unlucky in love and therefore deserves our compassion').

On that note, I should probably be marrying Peter.

Finally, the other day I crept to the top of the astronomy tower to cry about how sad my life is, when my indulgent moment of self pity, present while walking up the killer flight of stairs, was broken by voices at the stop of the staircase.

Two male voices speak incoherently, soft and slow stopped me in my tracks. He sat in an almost foetal position, his legs tucked in to his body, his face resting on his knees as he leant against the wall. Sirius sprawled, legs outstretched and back flat against the wall next to him, head lolling back on the bricks.

They murmured to each other quietly, pausing often, enjoying the stillness and the company. He turned his head towards Sirius multiple times, almost wishing that Sirius would do the same, however he never did. I understood him; their lips would have been too close for comfort that one time.

He might have had to cross that line.

So the boy who cannot be named leaned over towards Sirius and tucked his head in between his shoulder and head, nestling into the crook of his neck.

That's when I knew there was no hope for poor Marlene. She'll just have to find a nice Death Eater boyfriend to appreciate her. Perhaps Snape? He probably wouldn't appreciate my love for shampoo and nice smelling hair. Probably not my perfect match.

Back to the drawing board I go, to plan out my life just as McGonagall ordered.

Oh, and before I forget; I want to be an auror, mother and lover.

Until then,

Marlene M. McKinnon.


	4. Lily

**_A/N: _**

_Thank you to all the wonderful reviews, I really appreciate the effort that all of you go to in order to make this story better!  
Being halfway through there's just a couple of things I want to address:_

_1) I was lucky enough to have someone explain to me how to bypass the stories page debacle (so I could actually update!). The person I owe my fanfiction life to is InuLoveKawaii13 who got me out of this mess :) __Basically, if you get the goddamn type 2 error when you click on one of your stories, simply change the word 'property' in the URL to 'content.' Works a charm!_

_2) This is a fair slab of JPLE loving, so sorry if you're here for the RL/SB intensity (more is coming I swear), however I have to get a few characters out of the way first. However I do recognise that this story is posted under RLSB not JPLE so I will always endevour to include some sort of fluff, angst or love in there somewhere._

_I hope this chapter doesnt disappoint, after all the positive feedback I got from Marlene's chapter!_

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Lily

Dear Lily,

I wish you'd stop smiling so much, it's really rather nauseating seeing yourself look so giddy and excited in the mirror. The 'flush of love' as Marlene calls it, really doesn't complement your hair tone.

I'm trying to tell you that this sudden change in temperament is because my lifelong, obsessive dream of being Head Girl has been achieved, but that would be an outright lie. I'm sure older, wiser Lily would surely see right through it. Therefore, I'm not even going to try and lie to myself about certain issues disclosed within, despite the fact that I do so in my head every day. My incredibly annoying internal monologue is just a fountain of absolute bullshit that I really have to get rid of.

As for McGonagall; I was sure to ask her specifically about the extent of the assessment for this piece of work (who am I kidding, I do that with every piece of work), and she assured me that she would only be checking that we actually wrote it, not analysing what's within it.

It's probably a safeguard for her really, I don't think she particularly wanted to read 'The Joys of Having an Inflated Ego' by James Potter and 'Ode to Minnie' composed by Sirius Black.

But it's hard to avoid boys like them.

They're always in your face, playing around in class, shooting you flirtatious glances and whispering amongst themselves. You're never sure whether you're the object of their affections, the target in a longwinded and often unfunny prank or if they're simply laughing at you (for any reason under the sun). They're joking loudly, disrupting everyone, calling the professors by a ridiculous nickname and pushing the boundaries of deten- I can feel my bullshit meter rising; it's time to get straight to the point.

It's hard to avoid boys like James. Merlin knows, it's practically impossible.

I'm not speaking strictly literally either. See, James has the ability to stick around you for long periods of time, especially when you don't want him too, a bit like a fly on honey. But during those times when he disappears for a bit, leaves you to fend for yourself, you get a little desperate.

I've thoroughly convinced myself that he's been around me too much for my own good; because now, I positively don't have a clue what to do without him. It's almost as if he's grabbed the manual labelled 'Lily's Guide to the Future' and written his name into every sentence.

As much as it is annoying, it's very disturbing (and slightly distressing for someone as logical and thorough as I).

I was Lily Evans, head firmly on my shoulders with little time for the la di da crap that comes with falling in love.

Shoulders? Check.  
Head? Check.  
Lungs? Check.  
Heart? Err...

You're not stupid; you get the point, let's move on shall we?

I've always loved potions, ever since my first lesson. I'm not sure whether it's because I was just good at it, that my best friend was also good at it or because Slughorn loved that I was good at it.

Potions should be my one and only love, because it's so logical. If you follow the steps, you get to the desired result. No questions, no complications, just logic.

What's the logical career choice for people who excel at potions? Well since most of the potions inclined students spend most of their time in the dungeons (aka. Slytherins), you will most likely become a Death Eater.

Do I fit the career description?

1) Blind obedience to a manic depressive leader? Mm, not so much.  
2)Preference for dark clothing and ridiculous looking masks? No thanks.  
3)Stupidly wealthy family? Err, no again.  
4)Pureblood? Uh, well, that's just entirely too ironic.

So I think I'll settle with a Healing Academy.

Herein lays my issue.

See James wants to be an auror, and as much as I know he'd lick my shoes if I told him that it would get him a step closer to marrying me, I just can't see him wanting to dedicate his life to potions, a subject he took only because a) he wanted to be an auror and b) because I was in it.

But Lily Evans (who-doesn't-give-Peters-ass-about-what-anyone-thinks) can't let James be an auror on his own. Let's be brutally honest here; he wouldn't survive a day.

It's not because he's unintelligent; James is brilliant. He can also be very stupid.

He can't understand that this isn't a game that he's played in the backyard with Sirius when they go home on the summer holidays. Wizards in the war don't whiz around on broomsticks, sending the odd stinging hex over their shoulder whilst showing off the flips they learnt on the Hogwarts' Quidditch teams. He doesn't understand that Death Eaters won't take pity on him because he's so young. He doesn't understand that it's a real fight out there; people are grieving and hurting and _dying_.

And he is so young; a child, with so much more to live for.

He has so much more to do before he has to face that; has to even think about that. He has to live and laugh and love.

He has to pass his apparition test and his NEWTS, party and maraud (or do whatever in Merlins name the marauders do). He has to beg his mother to let him leave home, travel and see things just for the sake of seeing them. He has move in with Sirius, into some well paid for apartment (because his parents would never let them go without), and have firewhisky fuelled parties, and let me decorate it for them and clean it neurotically when it gets messy (which it will if boys are boys).

He has to let me move in when I can't stand Petunia any more, and move out with me when Sirius finally decides he wants Remus (as much as I want to prove Marlene wrong about this, I have a feeling that she's right – maybe just this once).

He has to let me spoil him and tease him and laugh with him when we're trying to make things work by ourselves. He has to wrap me up in swathes of blanket when it's cold and hold me to his chest; his heart beating warm and close to mine. He has to marry me and take me away from all the horrible things happening in our world, to somewhere where we can forget about them just for one minute.

I would stop with all this hopeless dreaming but I told myself that I would resist all urges to convince myself, even in writing, that I don't want it.

He has to tell me, remind me, show me, and convince me, every single day that he loves me. And then maybe I can convince myself to tell him that I love him back.

See, I wasn't joking when I said James Potter was stupid. He says he loves me over and over and over again. Then I roll my eyes and tell him to only tell me when he's sure over and over and over again.

But he won't stop; and I think I know why. He does love me. He loves me more than I am willing to admit.

Love is too scary, it's too big and mushy and absolutely thrilling. Because what happens when love goes away? I never want to be left with an empty void like that.

He loves tangibly and physically; I can _feel_ it when he presses his lips softly against mine, gently leaving small kisses, like butterflies, all over them.

When he does that, when he pulls me into his chest and runs his fingers through my hair in gentle running motions, all I want to do is tell him that I feel the same way. But logic, and reasoning and fear induced bullshit stop me every time.

Every moment seems like a perfect moment, every day something happens where all I want to do is scream out those three little words and be done with it. They're fluttering around in my trachea, trying to escape any way they can; but they can't.

As soon as they do, I know I'm stuck. As soon as they do, I suddenly become breakable. So I check them every time they try to escape; and it's awfully awkward.

For Example:

James: 'Seriously Lily, studying so much is bad for your health. In fact, you're _so_ unhealthily obsessed with that potions book that you forget to dress accordingly for the weather.'  
Lily: 'James, due to the fact that you don't study, and are hence, unlikely to pass NEWT examinations, there is no way in the world I will take your advice on anything remotely study related.'  
James: 'Relax flower, I only came down to hand you this, I don't want you to develop hypothermia, and then what fun would you be?' (Tosses a jumper into my vicinity).  
Lily: (Overly thankful for this unusually considerate gesture) 'Oh thanks, I love you...potions'.  
(Awkward silence ensues)  
Lily: 'Just loooooove potions.'

See what I mean? It's unavoidable.

Repressing it is just so unnatural too, it seems like I'm wasting such a good opportunity every time it comes up. I should really be thankful the person I have the urge to tell at least requites my feelings. Take the chance Lily.

There's so many other people out there that can't, or won't because they're scared or unsure or just so overwhelmed with the reality of it all. Being in love; so addictive, yet such a waste of time and energy.

Like if Remus is in love with Sirius, he's wasting an awful lot of time. Sirius is the schools womanizer, not a man-izer. Sirius may be beautiful and charming and funny, but he's flirtatious and flighty and too spur of the moment for Remus, even if he did swing that way.

It may look like I'm not a supporter of Remus' choice of lifestyle, but rather it's the choice of boy. Remus is one of my friends, letting him choose the wrong person is practically an indictable offence.

Remus is just too...good.

Sirius is just so...careless.

It's kind of like those lame allegorical nicknames that James always uses whilst trying to gang up with Marlene and convince me that they're practically in a relationship whilst being too scared to admit it.

They call Remus 'Moony' and Sirius is a star.

The moon revolves around its planet, which in turn revolves around the star. Its future is completely mapped out by the star because it's dependent on it for light and warmth and purpose (after all, if there was no star there would be no moon, or else the moon would be revolving around nothing). However the star is so hot, and big and powerful that it can spin the moon out of orbit, and should the star ever die, or come to the end of its life, the moon would cease to exist.

They're far too intertwined to ever live separately; yet the star doesn't need the moon to survive, whereas the moon is dependent on the star.

The star is so big it could swallow up the moon, drawing it closer and closer by its gravitational pull and then burn it, melt it, and discard it carelessly; because it simply doesn't need it. Compared to the bright star the moon is disposable.

But then if being the moon is so fragile, so threatened by a predatory star, then why is it running towards it with open arms? Why, if the moon is in danger of ceasing to even exist, does it look so happy to be so close to the star? Why is it, that when he wakes in the morning, and looks into the mirror, he probably looks the same as you, so happy, so disgustingly lovesick?

Because he lets himself be happy, he lets himself look so nauseatingly in love. It's good for him; it's not eating away at him like some kind of disease, just begging to be let out in the open. It may not be requited, it may not even be spoken of yet, but he knows, and the star knows, and they're letting themselves push the boundaries of it, even without having to say a word.

So my resolution, my goal in life, career dream whatever-the-hell-else-McGonagall wanted, is to let myself be in love, because that's what's going to make me happy.

So next time I see James, I'll think of Remus and Sirius, and shoot myself in the foot for being so illogical, and tell him:

James Potter, I love you.


	5. Severus

_**A/N: **_Thank you all for your very kind reviews on Lily's chapter. This chapter I think you'll find, is a little different to the rest.  
I really love Severus, but I hate writing him; it was a real struggle just to get through this, I hope I have done him justice.

Alice, Peter and Sirius to go. I initially said there would be an epilogue chapter; this has now been revised (ie, i have done what I do best which is changing my mind). Instead, Sirius' chapter will include the epilogue and go for twice as long as the normal chapters.

At least I think this is how it will pan out...thoughts?  
Also, for updates on my stories add me on twitter (link is on my profile page).  
As Always,  
Lola.

* * *

**Severus**

Dear S Snape,

I'm getting sick of the ink drops, sliding off the end of the quill. I've dipped it into the ink for the last twenty minutes, placed over the page and then gone back to aimlessly dipping. It's completely pointless, much like this goddamn fucking letter.

What is the deal here anyway? To guide completely lost souls who think they have a choice in life?

It's a joke; I've lived long enough, and hard enough to know that life likes to spin you around, push you to the ground, humiliate you, hurt you, mould you into its plan. It's not fair and it's not fun; it's reality.

There are those hopeful students that think they can achieve anything, can do anything if they set their mind to it. I see them everywhere, dizzy with the prospects of a life out of school, fulfilling hopes, dreams, and wishes. What a fallacy.

The storm is brewing; it's coming. I can feel the rush of blood to my limbs, taunting my sinewy muscles at the thought of it. I can feel the same dizziness of those lightheaded students at the prospect that perhaps, just maybe, I have bought back some kind of self control.

I feel the inexplicable adrenaline that comes with being _powerful._

There's never been a difference between good and evil; there is only power and those too weak to seek it. Those who, for reasons of love and lust and belief in the goodness of men, ignore the roaring lion in their chest, which seeks to control everything around them.

_Control; _the ultimate prize in a life full of turmoil and regret. This forum of self pity I loathe and detest, yet the control is the sweetest taste upon my tongue.

It's not about being _bad._

That's what some of us want. They want the rush that comes with flaunting the rules and having the power to hurt their enemies. They want to prove to the rest of the world that they are the black swan, the hooded one who abides by no law.

There are some that want recognition; that want the fame that comes with associating with the crowd of the _powerful_. They want to stand out from the mediocrity of their life.

There are those who want to _forget_. Who've done good and been scorned, loved and been trampled on and want revenge on those who hurt them. They want their enemies to hurt emotionally, to fear them, to think that they moulded them into the dark souls they have become.

It's not about any of those things. Neither is it world domination for me, or even the flaunting of a new world order.

It's about control; being able to push away the feelings of regret, of self pity; to offer myself up to something that is far larger than me. To submit to the will of someone who knows far greater than I, who can use me for his cause and discard me.

For I can use him too; use him to maintain something that I have never been able to secure before.

I can evolve into something beyond oversized robes and undersized pants. Who can use my years of testing the limits, practising the arts, perfecting incantations, concoctions and procedures to become an individual who can control their destiny.

Who life can no longer batter around like a cardboard box in the breeze.

Who no one will ever be able to hurt again, who will never feel the pains and aches of regret and love lost. Who will one day walk these corridors with a sense of purpose, forgetting the turmoil, forgetting the fear, forgetting _her._

But for now she stands, the imperfect angel, her halo dripping molten gold onto her slightly dirtied white robes.

Out of reach, high on the Christmas tree where those deemed unsuitable can't touch.

It's erroneous that I can't reach her. My hands are gentle, soft and loving, delicate enough to concoct the perfect potions, lithe enough to pour only the right amount of ingredient into it to make it the ideal colour. My hands could hold her softly, gently, catch her tears, mend her heart, and lift her down from the brightly lit, tacky Christmas tree to reality where the fallen angels belong.

It's unjust that those hard, calloused and careless hands, full of mistakes and scorn can hold her like I can't. Those hands which have held so many other angels, dirtying their brilliant white, melting their halos, crushing their wings, using them to help him fly. He can lift her from her pedestal and bring her down into his reality.

(Somewhere where love and lust is the same thing and angels are forgotten).

I'm always on the sidelines watching them tango, fall in step and act out the play I was supposed to lead. He leans casually and carelessly (as ever), against the doorframe of the classroom as I watch from behind the ugly suit of armour from the other end of corridor.

She floats gently towards him, coaxed like a moth to a flame, enticed by the colour of his cherry lips, unaware of the dangers he poses to her. Her wings are crumpled like recycled paper with clumps of glue holding them together – the concessions she has made in the name of the love she thinks she has.

He kisses her forehead (moving aside the dripping halo which droops at his touch) and whispers gently in her ear, tickling his breath against her neck and whispering the lies into her brain.

She responds by throwing her head back and laughing like he is joking, fooling, playing make-believe. She'll believe he's sincere until her wings have dissolved, her halo a shining molten pool at her feet and her dress as black as charcoal.

Then she'll give up, because she has no self control anymore.

I want to give her that, teach her that, let her learn that all is not in vain. He won't like it, he'll abuse me, scream at me, even kill me. But nothing could be more important than leading the angel away from him.

I would risk it all.

But instead I see her lean across the door frame and whisper something gently into his ear. I see her lips contort to form the unforgivable words, that short phrase, that sentence that seals her fate.

Something tears inside me as I see his eyes widen fractionally as the phrase embeds itself in his selfish mind. He acts as though it's a novel concept, but it's probably been told to him a million times by perfect angels (although none as brilliant as her).

But the surprise in his eyes is different this time she swears as he lets out a whoop of joy, roughly seizing her around the waist and spinning her around himself in bemusement. He sees nothing but this perfect angel, this piece of heaven, giving it all up for him.

Perhaps I even see something I didn't expect, the hands softening, the gaze altering.

(Perhaps it's not even lust anymore).

He lifts her to his lips, pressing them down a little more gently, a little less passion; trying to tell her a million things in one small gesture (because he knows she's all his now).

It's then I understand that life cannot be controlled by me, and that I need someone else to do it for me, no matter how weak or pathetic that notion is.

If flowers and weeds can embrace, and canines can love then the world is spinning out of control.

I can't even feel the longing seeing the moon and the star together that I do when I see the weed and the flower, but something bubbles inside me all the same. Because if the love of the moon and star is plausible in this entirely _fucked up_ world, then why is it I can't find what they have, the control that comes with securing someone else as your other half?

When I gave up on the angel and her demon, stalking back to the dungeons, I see the star and the moon together in the potions classroom, doing detention, arguing over which bottles to mark 'used.'

They're dancing around each other with words, denying each other of the chance of realising what it means to be loved, playing with each other's mind and heart like it's a game of snakes and ladders, the right word softening the opponent, the wrong one pushing you further away.

The moon reaches up to place a bottle on the shelf, (he could probably reach the angel too if he wished), and turns to face his adversary (or his lover). The star flashes him a smile of the most blinding light, and the moon is stunned, stopping in its orbit for the briefest of seconds.

It's the moment where everything turns freeze frame, and the outsider looks on like he knows what's going to happen before it does. Stock still I stand, pre determining the script before the actors play the scene out.

The moon whispers something, barely audible, littler more than a slip of the tongue and the star looks away, blushes almost (and no one has ever made the star go that colour). Then, without the star even taking control, or even contemplating the course of its actions, lets the moon draw him in, collapsing into his grasp as the celestial bodies collide.

It's all out war then, sun versus moon in a battle of Goliath and David. For the first time in my life I see the powerful lose out in a lack of anticipation. The moon crashing his usually soft spoken lips against the stars, and the constellations explode. There's nothing but a shower of sparks and wayward comets as the moon's lips caress the star's, softly tracking kisses around his jaw line, moving on the flesh like it's there to be explored, to be conquered.

But the star can only suppress its power for so long; and it retaliates in a flurry of lying angry words and deception.

(after all, he's only deceiving himself).

The moon is left alone and lost, and without a gravitational orbit as the star implodes.

The world needs control, stability.

Severus Snape.


	6. Peter

**_A/N: _**I hate Peter. But I think we ought to look at the reasons he betrayed James and Lily and why he double crossed our favourite marauders in the first place. So sorry for the updating drought, it took me a while to come up with enough excuses for Peter so I wouldn't despise him as much as I do.

* * *

**Peter**

Dear Peter,

When you're thirty, I really hope this whole mess has been sorted out. I really hope this whole mess with your friends, your family, your lack of girlfriends and cheese has been solved and forgotten.

When James and I met in first year he slung his arm around my shoulders at the Gryffindor house table carelessly and joked that he would be my first and only friend. When Sirius muttered across the table to a second year girl about changing seats to be next to us, he said it was because the third year next to him was a pompous git. When he sat down on my other side he glanced mischievously at James and I and whispered that he'd decided we'd be better suited to helping him carry out some of the outrageous ideas he'd planned for the rest of the school year. When Remus first sat down nervously next to Sirius during second year we thought he was a rule abiding, crazy nutter who was permanently in the library, hospital wing, or with his sick aunt. He turned out to be better at planning pranks than Sirius, and so, he completed the marauders.

(He was still crazy though, understandably the werewolf thing gives him a sort of edge).

We were sort of invincible during the five years we were all together. The professors thought they had all the control in the world but if we're really honest with ourselves they couldn't resist a bit of marauder charm. McGonagall especially, she sort of...

Shit.

**Disclaimer**: Anyone who happens to read this should note that all pranks, notes, stories, claims etc. that lie within this letter are complete fiction and do not apply in the real world. I.e. James never charmed that paperweight on Slughorn's desk to eat his letters as soon as he opened them, and McGonagall is most definitely immune to the charms of one Sirius Black. Remus Lupin is also most definitely _not_ a werewolf.

I swear.

I also love cheese, very much. Probably more than anything else, this is probably why I can't seem to get a girlfriend. There could never be enough cheese in this world.

There could never be as many problems in this world as there currently is.

See my friends, as dependable and devious as they are, have gone more nuts than they ever have before. Except this time it's not nuts as in, I've-got-a-really-good-idea (which often turns into a-very-bad-idea or a-very-dangerous-idea), its nuts as in, I've-suddenly-become-serious or I've-suddenly-become-dramatically-affected-by-teenage-hormones.

They're not coming up with ridiculous pranks, trying illegal magic or stealing firewhisky from Hogsmeade anymore. Instead, they're finding and protecting their girlfriends from slytherins instead of pranking them, or frantically avoiding each other like the plague.

James and Lily used to hate each other. Now all they do is worry about each other and on their off days, snog each other in the broom closets.

James and Sirius used to be best friends. Now they're still kind of friends but James spends all his time with Lily so Sirius spends all his time with Remus.

Remus and Sirius used to be good friends but now Remus and Sirius avoid each other like Snape and a bar of soap.

(Not that either of them look remotely like Snape).

I used to have three best friends. Now I have two best friends, a friend and a friend's annoying girlfriend. Additionally, none of them seem to want to spend any time with each other, which leaves me to listen to Sirius complain about Remus, Remus complain about Sirius, or James talk for five hundred years about Lily and how bloody fantastic she is.

These three options are worrying, worrying and excruciatingly, horrendously, insufferably boring.

Sometimes when I lie awake in the Gryffindor dormitory at night, I begin to wonder, not only about why I happen to be so hopeless at every class ever taught at Hogwarts, why cheese is so fantastically tasty or even about why Sirius always happens to snore so loudly. I begin to wonder about the future. This is something that has never crossed my mind before.

I always imagined that Sirius, James, Remus and I would move into some luxurious flat in London, probably financed by James' parents and Sirius' inheritance and live happily ever after as eternal bachelors.

Now I imagine that James will move into some luxurious flat, probably financed by his parents with Lily. Sirius will probably visit from time to time, just to annoy Lily (which is still his favourite past time), Remus will probably visit at alternate times to give James useful gifts such as food which he will forget to buy. I will be blissfully forgotten, probably still living at my parent's house.

It's going to be a struggle to ever move out without Sirius, Remus and James.

Not that money is all I depend on them for.

See if I had them here now, and by here I mean really _here_ in their normal heads with normal lives they could listen to the dilemmas I've been having and actually care instead of running off with girls or running away from each other.

My friends aren't the only ones that have gone nuts. So have my parents.

See there's this notion going around. James calls it 'Pureblood mania' and Sirius calls it 'Bullshit' but the slytherins I've head discussing it seem to reckon it's alright. Mum despises it, the lot of it, and gives me the 'we're all created equal' talk which she gave me that one time I picked on some kid with one leg in primary school.

Dad however, tells me that some muggles would do anything to be a wizard, which includes stealing wands and running around like they're one of us. He's a pureblood of course, mum's half, and she accuses him all the time of believing it only because he hates his mother-in-law, but I think it's something else.

So of course mum's leaving and moving south, she wants me too as well, says it'll be safer when this whole issue with Voldemort blows up. Dad's staying so what else can I do? The one that cares is the one that stays after all.

Maybe it's the rat sense in me that says it's fruitless to fight against He Who Must Not Be Named. After all, no one seems to be able to stand up to him except Dumbledore. There's also no way in hell anyone would compare my magical ability to Dumbledore. I didn't even pass my DADA exam in fifth year.

(I did however, get a Poor, not exactly the Troll I was expecting).

All I really want to do is _run, run, run_ like Wormtail tells me to, but I couldn't leave the only friends I've got. If they really are my friends anymore.

I don't even mind James being more _JamesandLily_ than just James. I do mind Sirius and Remus though, I just wish they'd kiss and make up already. Well maybe not kiss, that could be awkward and weird but the making up would be fine.

We could go back to the good old days where we all sat beneath the beech tree near the lake and joked and planned and pissed off the giant squid by skimming rocks onto its tentacles. James would lounge on the lowest branch, spread out on its thick wood on his back and pick apart the leaves, dropping them onto Remus' head below him. Remus would sit there; legs spread in a V-shape, leaning against the tree with leaves in his hair and read some kind of text book applicable for our next prank. Sirius would lounge (because all Sirius ever did was lounge), between Remus' legs, hands placed on the outside of the 'V' and legs outstretched. I would sit next to Remus, just out of James' leaf zone, usually on my back staring up at the sky. Lily was simply a pipe dream.

That was the marauders.

Now it's just Peter, just Remus, just Sirius, JamesandLily, a bunch of scary badies and those usual slytherins.

Things are always scarier without your friends.

Peter Pettigrew.


	7. Alice

**A/N: **...and then there was one to go!

I'm getting a little attatched now we're nearing the end of Dear Myself - I've really enjoyed writing it almost as might as I've adored all the support and feedback and lovely readers who have jumped on the HMS RLSB with me :)

In saying that, I'm getting so excited to finally let loose with Sirius; I love, love, _love_ writing him because I can chuck in a tonne of smartass comments wich I love writing hehe. Self indulgence is so nice. One reader did review saying 'isn't Remus going to open his too?' so I have to say NO FEAR, of course Remus will read his letter, although it will be through the eyes of Sirius, which I think will just make it all the more adorable, thoughts?

Oh and on the note of Alice. I did make her a little different than most writers do. I really **hate** how a lot of ff writers portray her as a goody two shoes push over, I personally adore her with a bit of attitude but a soft spot for a more mature and shy Frank. I wish I was Lily really - Marlene and Alice seem like they would have been killer best friends, not to mention the most perfect boyfriend in the world...

* * *

**Alice**

Dear Alice,

What will the name be on my shiny, new letterhead? Alice Black? Alice Longbottom? Alice Prewett? Alice Snape?

Too far! _Ergh_, for my sakes I hope not. Let's assess all _reasonable_ outcomes of my marriage prospects.

Now, I am fully aware that this letter is going to be full of absolute garbage, which to be honest, I don't really mind. I know if I was thirty reading this letter I would want to hear about all the really juicy stuff, not boring monologues about my life as Head Healer.

(That will just depress me later in life when I turn out working in the local tyre factory).

The tyre business is probably where I'm headed, as I simply refuse to get any work done in this place. Hogwarts is simply divine for gallivanting around with your friends, indulging in an endless pool of fantastic looking boys, causing general mayhem and doing absolutely _shit all._ That makes me sound like a horrid student if nothing else.

This is probably why McGonagall detests me so. That's just another in a long line of reasons that I plan on never ever handing this in. I think it's just so much more enjoyable that I keep it for my thirty year old self, pure, preserved and pristine as ever.

Marlene McKinnon (aka. The bane of my existence or otherwise known as my best friend) will tell you that pure, preserved and pristine are not words that could be used to adequately describe me. She likes to make the occasional jibe about my supposed promiscuity but we all know she's just jealous. So I like to play the field, as far as I'm aware that's hardly a crime, unless it's one against schoolwork.

When I started at this blessed institution at the tender age of eleven I was as innocent as a flower. Not as innocent as the real flower around here (the difference being I can actually talk about sexual intercourse without blushing or expose my ankle without feeling naked), but fairly shy and reserved. Of course then Marlene had to go and stuff that all up by being a general nuisance and pointing me in the direction of every second male in the Great Hall who wasn't sitting at the teachers table.

(To be honest she once did point out that Professor Dromatious would have been a strapping lad when he was younger but, as with many of Marlene's suggestions, I refrain from taking them literally).

So without being crude or literal, Marlene really did ruin me. She just plucked all those petals off my innocent white flower until I was thoroughly _de_flowered. She only has herself to blame.

Marlene of course, has been for the last few weeks, desperately depressed. Being her most trusted advisor on all matters deemed too inappropriate for little Lily Evans' ears, I know its Lupin. This matter has only been exacerbated over the last couple of days by spreading rumours that he was having a rendezvous session in detention with one, Sirius Black.

To be honest, I feel terrible for Marlene, but there's just a little part of me that's secretly relieved. Anyone will tell you that Marlene is a good looking girl, there's really no way around it, and although she may act more pristine than I do, she is hardly an angel herself. There are few males around here that wouldn't take a second, longer, leering look at her if she walked past, and few that would balk if she suggested they move to a more private location.

(These few exceptions include the Hogwarts homosexual population, blind kids – of which there are none and James Potter, who is too creepily obsessed with Lily that I don't think he realises that other females exist).

Hell, even I've ogled over Marlene on more than one occasion, as well as that one incident in fourth year which we-will-never-again-mention (also known as _strict_ teenage experimentation).

Point is, she's gorgeous and any guy would fall over his feet for her. No, I don't have a jealousy problem and I am also as straight as a stick, however Marlene and Lupin would be slightly problematic.

This is what happens if you have four male best friends and three female best friends. Two of them couple off and become the most intense, scary couple you've ever seen in your entire life. Their relationship consists of either being so fluffy you feel your teeth rotting just watching them, making out so intensely they could be in a porno or screaming at each other so the whole castle gets to listen in.

So now, if you're a girl, you're left with your other best friend who is not involved in a weird relationship and the three other boys to play nicely with _very platonically_.

Here's the problem. If another pair runs off to make sweet love in Moaning Myrtle's bathroom, there are only three left. In my case this includes the playboy billionaire and the small, ratty and extraordinarily unattractive-in-every-way-possible friend.

Now seeming's as you'd have to be in the Hogwarts blind student population (of which there are, again, none), to date Peter Pettigrew, Sirius Black seems like my only feasible option. If we ever went to Hogesmeade it would be like a quadruple date; James and Lily, Marlene and Remus, Sirius and I and Peter and his block of cheese.

Very, extremely, unnecessarily awkward.

To add to this mix is the blaringly obvious fact that I think Sirius Black is an arrogant prat at times and never in a million years would I even consider snogging him while not under the influence of firewhisky.

Another possible problem to this scenario is that _maybe _I have been spending a lot of time with Frank Longbottom at the moment and I _maybe_ finding that he is _slightly_ attractive (even though a little clumsy and shy), and I _maybe_ also have a day in Hogesmeade planned with him next week which I _may_ have forgotten to disclose to Marlene and Lily.

But back to Sirius being a prat.

The reasons above are all indicative of the fact that although I really love Marlene Madeline McKinnon and want her to be happy, I simply could not have stood another, slightly watered down, more polite version of James and Lily. It would be impossible to handle.

Plus I think that, within the gooiest, most _ergh_ part of my brain, that Remus would be happier off with his little secret love (which isn't so secret anymore). He seemed to become very un-Remus like when they had some kind of lovers tiff the other day; they avoided each other like the plague for a whole 72 hours before giving in.

Of course Marlene had become a bit woefully hopeful when Remus was acting un-Remus-y, because he was storming around and using more colourful language regarding Sirius than he had ever done in his entire life. I practically had to turn cartwheels in the common room to distract her long enough to get her from the portrait to the dormitory without laying eyes on the two of them lounging on the common room couches, probably kissing and making up.

(How very fitting).

Boys; speaking on behalf of the female population, we will never fully understand you.

How for instance, you love to repress your feelings for each other even when it's all out and about like anybody's business. How you give each other those secret little smiles when you think no one's watching. The way your mouths just pick up at the corners gently, so it's more of a smirk, but you hold the other's eyes just for a second too long to be passing and then you drop them away like you're all embarrassed and shy.

How the playboy billionaire suddenly lost his balls and flushes a deep tomato at the word 'sex.' How instead of getting into amateur duels with slytherins, sneaking into the kitchens for additional food and punching his friends, he would actually rather spend his time spread out across the common room couch, head in another boys lap, dozing while his _friend_ carefully runs his fingers through the black, curly mess that is his hair.

How a scarred and scared young boy sits upright on that very same couch, threading his fingers meticulously through the playboy billionaire's hair, pushing it back softly and soothingly, gazing down at him like he holds the whole world in his hands.

I really want to tell him that love is not all it's cracked up to be, and that they should really tone it down in consideration of poor Marlene, but I just couldn't even if I tried. Aside from the fact that they're saving me a lot of awkwardness by not creating the awkward love quartet, it just looks to perfect to interrupt.

Young love, my dear Alice, may be stupid and fruitless but it sure damn nice to have. Even if you're just witnessing it from the outside. Even if it's not even logical. Even if no one would have expected it if Snape had never have told the whole bloody slytherin common room.

That's why, feeling like the biggest friend traitor in the world you smile knowingly at Remus' face as you lead Marlene away, knowing that even though he'd never notice you were there in the first place, you really hope his heaven works out.

Please someone knock me out. Alice is never, ever really this fluffy. I'm practically waving pom poms like those American sitcom cheerleaders that I watch on the black and white set at home and handing out rainbow 'it's okay to be gay' cards. Call me head of the Remus-Sirius fan club.

So seeming's as this has turned into a sop-fest and it's completely nauseating to read I may have to say goodbye here. I really hope things work out for you.

Aside from that, there are just so many other better things to do than actually complete more than two words of McGonagall's work. Like distract Lily or plan how to scam firewhisky from the HogsHead for the next quidditch party.

...Or find Frank and snog him silly.

Until the time in which your letter head will have changed,

Alice H. Green.


	8. Sirius

**A/N:** The final chapter has arrived! When I began writing this I never expected it to continue so long, but it has, and it feels so good!  
I hate that this is the end of Dear Myself - I've loved writing every character (yes, even Peter), and I'm going to miss all of my readers horrendously.

This is why I must remind you that no matter how final Dear Myself is, I will always be posting R/S one shots everywhere, so no fear, this is not the end! I'm also about to post another R/S, J/L called **'If I Saw You In Heaven.'** It's slightly AU (as in, JK never wrote about it) but it follows the cannon of DH and the epilogue.

I would also like to make a quick mention to LittleScottieGal, Evol Love and A Sirius Crush On Moony for being with me from chapter one to now. Thank you for your support, it really has been amazing.

Sirius, Sirius, Sirius. Let's go.

* * *

The small, insignificant tastes of freedom given to Sirius each month were enough to drive him near crazy with exhilaration. Muggle London was dirty and disease ridden, but nothing could be more exciting to a hunted man, the person behind the mask. The sounds, the smells, probably exacerbated by his unhuman form were enticing, tantalising and horribly bitter-sweet.

It wasn't a usual occurrence to be let out of the house of his ancestors, so he lived for these moments. He lived for the capability to stroll down the dirty streets of London, passing by humans, muggles and otherwise alike and wonder how it would feel to be utterly free. People really didn't appreciate the freedom they could apply, he thought. It was a right that few exercised fully, few appreciated; perhaps only those who had been tried and freed or imprisoned and released.

(Or those who were, most like him, escaped and on the run).

Many would consider his predicament to be a fortunate one, that he should be celebrating his total freedom considering the barbaric situation in which he had once been trapped. Behind large cement walls, a freezing ocean and soulless, unhuman creatures. However little did they realise that freedom is sometimes just as incarcerating. Living in fear, always ready for someone to sneak up behind you, grasp your life with two hands and take it from you. Freedom was nothing but insecurity.

There were other things too, keeping him from throwing his head back and laughing with the exhilaration of being the only known human being to escape, unarmed and unaided from the cells of Azkaban. Factors which were highly emotional and close to home; frustratingly irritating.

Things, feelings which had begun so long ago, lost so long ago, and yet haunted him consistently. The emotions never ceasing, never relenting, never _freaking_ leaving him alone.

And yet he was on his own, aside from those nagging little voices and stomach lurches, he was utterly on his own. Not in terms, of course, of physicality. There was always someone nearby at his childhood home; Order members and friends...

(Although it was as if sometimes they were more his keepers and guards than his mates).

These people living around him were always by his side, but they never really wanted to hear his stories. Never really wanted to joke around like they would have if he was not a wanted man and there wasn't a war going on which involved every single one of them. They were the softer and more veiled form of dementors, keeping him inside the damned house, not only for 'your own good' but for the good of themselves.

(And the Order which was _forever_ taking precedence).

Of course Sirius was sympathetic. There was nothing less he would like to see than for the terrorising, murderous Lord to meet an end like he handed out to so many others. Nothing more he would like to see than James' death avenged, for order to be restored, to be freed, to be happy.

Nothing more he would like to see than for Harry's life to be secure and safe, so that they could be together again, misfits without a family who could cling to each other for the support and love they needed.

He was Harry's only living relative (despite not being by birth), and Harry was his only family left. The only of his family that he liked.

(Much less loved).

He felt like a parental figure to him, and wished he could be. But the more he saw Harry growing older and finding his feet, the more of James he could see in him. Then it was almost impossible to become a guiding figure when all he wished for was to be his friend.

Sirius had so lacked a best friend like James for the majority of his life since his friend's death, and Harry was the only one who seemed to be able to sympathise with Sirius, to be able to understand his pain, even if he never showed it. Harry was, the only living human being who seemed to appreciate Sirius for who he was, and not look down on him like an outcast who had been plucked from society and thrown away for years.

He was the only one who seemed to understand that Sirius was more than just the Peter Pan many of the Order members suspected. He had just as much knowledge and power as the rest of them and _fuck what they say he knew so well how to use it._

There was one other who Sirius had once called a friend. One other, more akin to his age and experience, one other person who Sirius had once treasured.

However he had turned his back on Sirius, as had so many others, casting aside their memories and throwing them in the boxes at the back of Grimmauld place, growing old and smothered in grime and filth.

These were not like the other memories which haunted the house, nothing that Kreacher would pine over or collect, walk around with and grumble about his goddamn mother and her greatness. These were not memories Orion or Walburga would appreciate nor tolerate, nothing that Harry would probably ever know about, memories that very few could appreciate. Only two could appreciate.

But there wasn't two anymore. Well, there was. But it was a different two.

(And hence, again, Sirius had been cast away like those memories, probably insignificant in that persons' mind).

So in these moments Sirius had the freedom to walk around, unbeknownst to the population of the world in his canine form, but he did not have the freedom to love. Love someone who had once thought he loved purely platonically. Love someone who had secretly cut a slit into his heart, filled it up with warm, buttery substance and filled him for so long. Someone who had painfully drained it within seconds, with one huge misunderstanding and one huge mistake.

Occasionally he thought he had seen this person exchange a glance with him secretly, as if there was some acknowledgement of things past. But these instances did nothing to soothe the cuts and pain that his heart endured. Nothing to stop it from becoming as dark and empty as his surname.

Nothing could be more hurtful, more irritating than choosing another while he was here; while he was living in the same house. Sirius' own second _cousin_ for god sakes.

He felt like the victim of a schoolgirl's revenge, taking out the better looking relative to compensate for the unceremonious dumping of the other.

(Sirius believed that only happened in Hogwarts, but apparently that was also a lie).

Sirius used to be so good at concealing his emotions, concealing his hurt, hiding his irritation. You tended to learn this as a Black; it was little less than a survival tool. Regulus was never good at it, which was probably the reason he tried and failed to survive as the real breadwinner of the family.

However he found that in the current climate it was becoming very difficult to build his facade as effectively, and that he was fading fast into the pitfalls of anger. Everyone could see he was unhappy, although thankfully, little would guess as to why.

Perhaps there was no one. Perhaps no one even bothered to care or tell. Perhaps he was really seen as just the caged animal which had to be tamed for the greater good.

Fuming and frustrated by the negativity of his own thoughts, Sirius stepped onto the bottom step of the house which was quickly protruding out of the space parted by the two adjacent houses and transformed quickly when it had finished. He pounded angrily up the stairs of number twelve, and inconspicuously to all muggles who braved the grime and dirt that constructed the streets of Grimmauld Place, slipped inside the worn, black oak door.

The thin and dank corridor greeted him like an old foe, with the screeching voice of his mother filling the house as he slammed her curtains shut forcefully, silencing her.

From here he proceeded to saunter down the corridor noisily, taking no care to be discrete or careful, knowing that no matter how much noise he should make, no one would look in his direction.

Some of the Order members had assembled around the large oak kitchen table, fiercely discussing something which he guessed to be related to _everyone's favourite villain_.

Only one person bothered to raise their head from the discussion as he slumped onto the wooden bench at the bottom of the table, who was there to banter him about escaping from his elected chaperone, Mundugnas Fletcher.

After explaining thoroughly to Molly Weasley through rapid and sour eye signals about his unwillingness to discuss the issue, he turned his attention to the discussion, which was heating up before him.

'We know that he's been attempting to control someone within the Ministry for quite some time, it's a dangerous predicament if he manages to succeed.'

'True, however it would be a great discredit to Dumbledore, and at the expense of Harry if we were to somehow alert the Ministry to this fact. Not to mention we would all be branded as liars.'

'Is that really for the greater good though Minerva? It seems like we are being awfully flippant about human life here!'

'If Dumbledore sees fit to exercise subtlety in the matter, I think we ought to do that. I believe I can do much more, especially in the way of protecting and guiding the students if I am not seen as Fudge's public enemy number one! Think of the effect that parents have on our younger generation, if they believe we are all against the Ministry, and thus, the control of the wizarding world, we may lose many students, students which are the key to carrying on the fight against He Who Must Not Be Named.'

'But the consequences of having an insider in the Ministry, and the protection of other Ministry workers must be considered to be paramount, should it not?' Sirius heard Molly Weasley interrupt, glancing fretfully at her husband.

'Of course, but how much good will it do to try and instruct most Ministry officials Molly? Goodness knows many of them wouldn't believe a bar of what we would be attempting to warn them about. Then we may be in more danger of exposure and attack.'

'But still...'

'Subtlety is the key Molly.'

'How on earth can we be expected to be subtle with a Ministry worker coming and going from this house, a man who is considered to be attempting to dethrone The Minister For Magic, the boy who lived, not to mention harbouring a convicted criminal who is running to and fro from here unchecked!' She screeched loudly, losing her self control within the seconds of her outburst.

Sirius gritted his teeth painfully against his lip, feeling a trickle of red collect there as the table turned to face him.

It was uncomfortable to say the least, and melting under Molly's scathing look and the indifference shown to him by the remainder of the table, he awkwardly scraped the chair on the stone floor and stood, shifting his weight uncomfortably, soothing his raging anger and attempting to control an angry outburst.

'You know, if it would be more comfortable to have around twenty individuals marked out by Voldemort himself for extermination around at your house Molly, we could arrange that' he muttered, through his gritted teeth.

'Now, Sirius, we are grateful for the meeting place which you have supplied for the Order' Arthur soothed, reason flooding his voice as he attempted to calm his often hot headed wife.

'There seems to be very little else I can do around here' Sirius snapped, lips receding over his teeth in a very canine expression of anger, 'but if even that is useless to you, please, you have my _permission_ to clear out.'

With that spark of frustration his eyes fell upon Remus Lupin's at the end of the table as he emphasised the 'clearing out' notion. The grey anger met the confused hazel for just a second, before Remus dropped his head and his eyes shifted back into unfocussed indifference.

Sirius stormed up to his abandoned bedroom noisily and flopped down on his unused bed. Dust pillowed up from his movement and resettled, covering him in it and making him cough repeatedly.

God. This house was forever being unhospitable in every way possible.

Usually Sirius preferred to sleep in animagous form. It was much more comfortable, not to mention he could fall asleep almost anywhere with ease. It was also a lot easier to ignore the complex human emotions when he was so animalistic.

(If James were alive he would have hated it though, Sirius always snored so loudly as Padfoot).

Curling up on his grimy duvet, he attempted to fall asleep as Sirius; however the sneezing and coughing made it too difficult, if nothing else. Instead, he circumnavigated his room, picking up dusty toys and Gryffindor memorabilia and placing it down again as he did it. He smiled sadly at the pictures of James that adorned his bedside dresser. James in second year, sleeping with _Lily Evans' Bitch_ scribbled across his head in permanent ink, which Sirius had taken with James new Polaroid camera. There was James with his arm slung around Sirius' shoulder casually, laughing at something, his eyes crinkling up in the corners familiarly. This was a wizarding picture, because James was forever laughing beside Sirius' bed as if nothing was wrong with this world.

There were pictures of Peter which Sirius threw, unceremoniously to the floor, stomping over them angrily and crushing the glass until it was like sand on the floor.

Then there were pictures of Remus. Remus with his arms around Sirius' waist, poking his head out from around Sirius' stomach, grinning mischievously as Sirius saw himself grin fondly down at him and mutter a sarcastic comment or teasing anecdote. There was Remus with his hands in his pockets, grinning sheepishly at James while Sirius leaned against the Astronomy tower wall.

Then there was Sirius' favourite picture. A picture of the three of them, James, Sirius and Remus, sprawled out under the Beech tree by the lake. James flopping upon the highest branch, covering Remus' hair with the Beech seeds, laughing at something Peter was saying from behind the camera. There was Remus, lounging nostalgically against the tree, his hands out by his sides, his legs splayed in front of him casually. Sirius was lounging, his head upon Remus' chest, leaning against him and smiling as if nothing could have been more perfect.

(And nothing ever could have been).

He flung the photo onto the ground, but instead of stamping all over it, like he did to Peter, he simply tossed it under his bed with a sigh. It was but a pipe dream now.

Flopping back down on his bed, and again, coughing a lung out in the process he was contemplating heading back downstairs to the hostility as a temporary cure to his loneliness before his door was gently opened by an aged woman, with hair in a tight bun, giving her a sort of strict, yet somehow motherly demeanour.

'Sirius,' his old transfiguration teacher spoke sharply, striding across the bedroom floor with purpose, grimacing at the filthy state of the room, 'it really isn't very dignified to live in such filth, and it's very unwelcoming.'

'Perhaps it is for that purpose that I wallow' He muttered, shoving his face in his dust ridden pillow, acting severely like a child in the midst of a tantrum.

She stood, awkwardly above the bed, in a strict fashion, showing no signs of great sympathy. He understood, it was hardly in Minerva's nature to be so soft, however he saw the affection behind her spectacles, scanning him like she would her own son.

He rolled over and sighed heavily and cocked his head wearily, as if to ask why she was even there, and bothering with such a hospitable person.

She fumbled in her cloak and pulled out a bunch of dog eared papers, worn with the passage of time and yellowed from age, or what looked as if to be coffee spills. Of course McGonagall's answer would be reading.

She thrust the papers at him forcefully; leaving her arm extended until he clasped them firmly and tugged them from her grip. She sighed in resignation and headed towards the door again, retreating towards the warmer, less dirty space below.

As she was about to exit the room he called out, breaking the uncomfortable silence.

'What are these?'

'Something to inspire you Sirius, remind you why we are making the hard decisions, fighting for what is right. Something to remind you that there are greater problems in this world than yourself, reminding you that despite your grievances, there is always something worth living - worth fighting for' She murmured, piercing him with a meaningful stare 'I hope you find them beneficial.'

She then swept out of the room, her cloak billowing out behind her, back stiff as if she were patrolling the corridors of Hogwarts.

Sirius turned the letters over in his hands, studying the outside, wondering what they contained. There was another soft knock on the door.

He sighed heavily again, conveying, he hoped, an irritation with the intruder but not denying them entry. He almost fell off the bed when Remus Lupin strode in; hands grasping identical looking papers to those Sirius had stuffed onto his cluttered bedside table.

'Have you read these?' he asked, head held low, voice quivering as if he were cold.

Sirius looked up quickly and noticed Remus' cheeks were wet, his eyelashes condensed with tears which he was trying to hide, roughly swiping his sleeve over his face.

What kind of reading had McGonagall prescribed? Usually Remus looked like he wanted to marry books or readings, not cry over them. Books were, generally speaking, his reason for living.

'No' he muttered, unsure of a better, snappier remark. A one letter word. He had imagined his first real conversation with Remus to be, since they had stopped talking a year ago, somewhat more sarcastic and inflicting.

'Open them.'

'Why would I want to look like a sodding mess?'

'Don't be an asshole Sirius.'

'That's rich.'

'Stop it Sirius!'

Sirius did stop. He'd never heard Remus sound so weak or helpless before. The snappy remarks Sirius spat out over a bunch of silly paper had reduced Remus to an injured puppy on the floor. Maybe a wolf pup; how fitting.

Remus had been spending the full moons in the basement of Grimmauld place since Sirius had returned. Sirius was never with him.

It pained him to know that Remus went through the transformations alone now, couped up in the all cement cellar, where Sirius was so often sent in his childhood. He had once allowed himself to enter as Padfoot, whilst Remus was passed out on the floor after the moon had set, and saw nothing but blood and broken bones; the transformations had grown more painful.

There was so little he could do though, with everything happening at breakneck speed around him, without him, and Remus avoiding him like the plague.

'Why should I?' Sirius murmured after a minute of silence, 'It's not as if you've ever stopped ignoring me, even when I asked you to.'

'That's different, you know it is.'

'HOW IN SODDING HELL AM I SUPPOSED TO KNOW ANYTHING REMUS, IF YOU NEVER TALK TO ME?' he yelled, his teeth protruding from his lips again as Remus cowered away from the bed.

'I couldn't Sirius, it's just with everything...'

'So what? You had to even deny me the _privilege_ of at least knowing why my best-bloody-friend, never mind my ONLY bloody friend, has suddenly turned against me like mother and her bloody house elves?' He screamed, shooting himself up from the bed angrily and advanced on Remus who backed away towards the far wall.

'You know she murders them right?' he snarled, advancing still, Remus silenced by his frustration which was bubbling out of him at a rapid rate.

'Cuts off their heads, throws away their bodies, throws away their _heart_ like its trash.' He bit again, reaching Remus and shoving him up against the wall forcefully.

Suddenly he was way too close to Remus to do any more damage, unless it was going to include himself enveloping the other males lips with his, so he faltered, and his anger, his irritation, stopped exploding out of him, just for a second.

Remus wanted to take his chance and duck under Sirius' arm and _run run run_ but he couldn't. His heart was exploding in tiny little pieces in his chest, and he thought he could feel it bleeding down him like crimson blood. All those tiny, little bubbles of emotions burst again from his suppression, and they filled his mind with thoughts of just leaning forward a little more and pressing his lips up against Sirius', just like he did in seventh year, although it feels like just yesterday...

But Sirius dropped his arms dejectedly and stalked back over to the bed, sighing and plucking the letters with him.

Remus didn't want to give up that easily, he wasn't going to let Sirius drop it again, and have them never discuss anything which he admitted, was somewhat his fault.

'We were never just friends Sirius.' He sighs, tentatively coming closer to the bed and flopping himself down on the edge, sitting a fair distance from the sleeping dragon who lay face up on the other side of the luxurious manchester.

'We were never enemies either' he spits, bitterness emanating from him.

'Sirius I could never hate you,' Remus travels off, sighing and feeling dejected.

'I would never have thought you could betray me either' he recalls, biting into Remus' defences and trying to find something else to hurt him with.

'Sirius I'm not going to apologise for...'

'My own cousin?' he snarls, head popping up from the pillow and sneering nastily.

'I'm sorry' Remus whispered instinctively.

Sirius bit his lip again and felt utterly guilty. This really wasn't how he envisaged Remus and himself behaving.

'You should read them' Remus sighed, nodding his head in the direction of the letters, 'I got Marlene's, Wormtail's and Snape's. McGonnagall obviously felt I needed to be reminded of more depressing things.'

Sirius shifted his weight as a memory came back to him. McGonagall and her stupid, worthless assignments. He had never paid any attention to them since he had been somewhat natural at transfiguration and even better after he had mastered his animagous transformation, but he did recall one particular assignment which had got the student body in a tizz.

He grasped the letters more tenderly and gently opened the sash which had clasped them together. Four letters spilled out onto his bedspread.

The first that caught his eye was one with neat and prissy handwriting. A perfectionist's scrawl with the i's all dotted perfectly and the t's all crossed. He knew instinctively who it belonged to.

Anxious to pry into Lily Evans' private thoughts he fluttered it open and read impatiently.

'_Dear Lily,_

_I wish you'd stop smiling so much, it's really rather nauseating seeing yourself look so giddy and excited in the mirror..._

He really hated girls' writing, it was too neat, and too perfect, none of which described Sirius very well, but this letter held such significance and intrigue. As he continued he felt his motive change a little. This wasn't some kind of joke to hear about how Lily had loved Prongs all along and that he should have felt an '_I told you so´ _moment, it meant more than that. It was learning about someone who he had never known as deeply as this, never understood as significantly, and his heart ached somewhere for the loss.

Prongs had always been the one he had missed more than anything, and whenever he thought of Harry he thought of James and how much they were alike. However reading Lily's thoughts, smirking at her sharp wit and sighing at her resolve made him realise that his godson was truly more half and half than he had ever expected.

He saw Harry's resolve, humour and humaneness come from Lily's letter, which he found to end too soon and although he had enjoyed it immensely, he tossed it to the end of his bed, eager to read the next.

The second letter was more of a messy scrawl, although it had lovehearts for the top of the i's so he assumed again, it must have been a girls writing.

Alice's named popped up at the top and he read eagerly, laughing at her description of James and Lily's weird romance and how he was most definitely a prat.

Tossing that one to the end of his bed he noted two others, both male writing, both a messy, almost illegible print. To Sirius the handwriting looked utterly different, however he appreciated how professors got their work mixed up occasionally. He and James were so alike, even in academics.

Gingerly handling James' letter he read it, rolling his eyes in exasperation when it was, as if he had not predicted it to be, all about Lily. He grinned mischievously at James' arrogance, his quips to himself at thirty, and his age old fear of Sirius thinking he was a girl.

His eyes pricked with wetness as he thought about how James never got to read his letter, never even received it. He was gone, ten years too early.

After re reading it another two times he set it down gently on the bedside next to him, looking after it wistfully. Remus picked it up gingerly in his hands and flipped it open, eyes on Sirius as if to gauge any reaction.

Sirius looked away, ashamed that he was unable to hide his emotions as effectively as he usually did, and picked up the fourth and final letter.

This scrawl, he recognised immediately as his own.

_Dearest Sirius Orion Black, firstborn heir to the most noble and esteemed house of Black, residing in the ancestral home of Blacks given to you by good old Uncle Alphard (a bit batty he was), removed off the family tree, definitely not a slytherin and most definitely never to become a Death Eater to Lord Voldy himself,_

_ I have instructed one, violent James Potter, that if you dare become one of those batty prats that constitutes your family and extended family, so help him god, he will kick you in the place no-boys-wish-to-be-kicked._

_I was originally planning for this 'dear self' letter to be originally titled 'Ode To Minnie' in the hope that McGonngall will finally fall for my charms, but James let me know, after I tried to snatch his and read his most intimate thoughts of Lily Evans (don't worry James, that's why I have a subscription to Witch Weekly), that she's not actually going to read them._

_Don't ask me how he knows that, I hope to god that he didn't actually ask her, but judging by the tomato-like reaction I got in the process of stealing it, he's not planning on letting Merlin open that document. You'd think it was highly classified or something._

_He probably needs someone to read it. Don't get me wrong, James' fledging relationship is nice and all, but he really needs a good shove in the right direction if you know what I mean._

_I, of course, shall be doing the shoving. I know loads about girls._

_(Not that Lily's really a girl to be honest; she seems more like the female reincarnation of Satan. If she regrettably wasn't a muggleborn, her and my mother would get on like anything – and what a horror that would be)._

_I know that girls like smooth talkers. James could definitely be a smooth talker if he wasn't confronted with Lily Evans. I've seen him do it before. He completely wound Hannah Muttlebridge around his little finger when he was trying to make Lily jealous (which was completely intentional despite what Remus might say), and she was two forms above him._

_He just turns to a pathetic mush with Lily, never mind the fact that Super-Head-Girl has some witty remarks of her own. Must have picked them up in the fiery depths of hell, perhaps that's where she goes back to every summer._

_Girls like boys that are dangerous and adventurous, that's why we always used to make up little white lies to get girls to go out with Pete (because aside from being Wormtail he really hasn't got all that much going on for him). He's just much too addicted to cheese we found, as well as the fact that we can't just go screaming about his transformations from the top of the astronomy tower. Pete will be the ultimate eternal bachelor unless, by some stroke of luck he becomes filthy rich._

_Thirdly (and very importantly), girls love a good kisser. I am a good kisser. Peter seems like he would be an awful kisser. Cheese breath just doesn't sound appealing. James, given the enthusiasm with which Lily greets him when they're not in the middle of a ferocious row is probably also a fair kisser._

_Remus is an excellent kisser._

_Awkward silence ensues by thirty year old Sirius. Awkward silence ensues by Minnie when James has lied and she actually reads this. Awkward silence ensues by anyone else who may stumble upon this letter._

_Yes, I would know Remus is an excellent kisser and being Sirius Black, who does not give a rat's ass about who knows (because I am **just that attractive**) and doesn't really care if awkward silence is ensuing._

_Sure, I like girls. That's why this situation is just so goddamn confusing. _

_I love the way girls twirl their hair and flutter their eyelashes at you flirtatiously. I love the softness of girl's kisses. I love the fact that they wriggle into your arms when they're cold and you can just hold onto them and warm them up._

_In some ways, if they are not affiliated with Satan, they are adorable._

_Being less soft, in some ways they are also sexy. Like Marlene McKinnon in her school uniform when she's been flustered by Mandrakes or other herbology classes (which she is just **really bad at**). A flustered Marlene is every Hogwarts guys fantasy. Huge tits, nice ass, lovely legs. She's just the whole package and sure, I can appreciate that._

_On the other hand, I really can't look at any guy (other than Remus) and conclude that they are sexy. All up, they are just too hairy, and sure, Remus is an excellent kisser but anyone else is just not really attractive in the slightest._

_I don't think I'm gay._

_But obviously I'm not as straight as a stick either._

_Confusion is just ruining my brain cells (which god knows I do **not** need for my NEWTS as I just BS everything anyway), but it's so much more simple if I just put it out there plain and simple._

_Sirius Black is not heterosexual_

_Sirius Black is not homosexual_

_Sirius Black is just Remus._

_Not as in, I am Remus. As in, all I want is Remus. I don't want a girl or a guy or anything else in between all I want is Remus. _

_(Merlin knows Sirius Black always gets what he wants too)._

_I'm going on the assumption of course, that Remus is just Sirius, and judging by his reaction the other day he is. See, it was a little confronting to say the least, when Remus showed me his Sirius-ness (hehe) in the potions classroom. I got a little needlessly shocked._

_But now I am thoroughly convinced I am definitely Remus._

_In saying that, I get the feeling RemusSirius is definitely not going to be textbook. There's never going to be any pet names, 'I love you baby's or snuggles on the couch in broad daylight. People may never even know RemusSirius._

_However that bothers me very little. Of course I don't care in the slightest if people do know RemusSirius, all I'm saying is that RemusSirius is always going to be a little **fucked up.**_

_(Just another occupational hazard when seducing a werewolf)._

_There's just **something** about Remus. I knew I'd gotten those stupid stomach lurches and butterflies for ages before he attacked me in the potions room, but I never had the guts to suggest it. _

_Sirius Black should ultimately be bold and brave (just the Gryffindor in me I suppose), so I really couldn't resist touching him a little unnecessarily, embracing him a little more frequently, lounging all over him when it wouldn't look suspicious..._

_It's just so bloody **nice** being around Remus._

_It's just so bloody **frustrating** being around Remus._

_Sometimes I just want to release what I'm sure is the overly testosterone filled Padfoot inside me and snog his brains out._

_I have plenty of opportunities._

_Remus has this werewolf thing that keeps him up during the night; aches and pains in his bones I suppose for twenty four hours after the end of his transformation. For the first three years he stayed in the hospital wing, but he said he got sick of it, and after we found out about his furry problem, he began coming back for the night._

_He just can't sleep however, and it makes for a terribly grumpy Moony the next day if he doesn't. So in late fifth year he heard me tossing and turning after a nightmare on the same night, and asked me to talk to him, something to soothe him and keep his mind off the niggling aches._

_From then on I did it every night. It began that I would sit at the end of his bed, cross legged and amuse him with stories (when I say amuse I mean he mostly rolled his eyes and muttered under his breath about my arrogance and stupidity – he loves my flaws obviously). It then so progressed to sitting closer to him on the bed, then lounging out top to toe on the bed, to falling asleep on his bed, to sleeping top to toe under the covers and purposefully sleeping there, to the full moon before last when we accidently ended up on the same side and ended up sleeping under the covers and within thirty centimetres proximity. _

_It's very warm in Remus' bed. It's a lot more comfortable than mine. _

_The latest full moon, we ended up non-accidentally on the same side and definitely within thirty centimetres of each other. In fact Remus was tucked into my chest, facing away from me, his back and limbs curling to fit the curvature of mine. His hand was wrapped around mine completely and my breath was ruffling his hair on the back of his head._

_Of course waking up in such a position with your best mate is slightly concerning, but it was just so **comfortable** that I had to stay there and definitely pretend I was asleep when Remus got up, completely unashamed of his behaviour and sauntered off to the bathroom._

_I only stayed like that because it was comfy, I swear. (Read, this was definitely not because I had been having those annoying mushy feelings for my best mate for over a year)._

_Pete and James definitely didn't think anything of it because they know Moony stays up this late the night after. If Pete and James knew...well I don't know what they'd think. Of course Peter is still my mate and James is always going to be my best mate, like my brother, but Remus is just...he's just Remus. I'm just Sirius and we are RemusSirius._

_I don't even know how this is all going to turn out. Like if I end up going through a phase and like girls, if Remus goes through a phase and likes girls (not that Marlene McKinnon though she is affiliated with devil woman) or if it just pans out wrong like most teenage romances do. On second thoughts this isn't a romance, that's just too soft and mushy. This is..._

_Well I'm not really sure what it is. It's RemusSirius._

_But I actually kind of really want RemusSirius to work out. Remus is perfect in the way that absolutely no one else in this world is._

_He'd disagree with me but he has the nicest body, all muscular but lean from transforming. His scars are just so interesting, you can trace them all over his body and he gets those little goose bumps from the cold. He's always going to be my Moony no matter what._

_If it doesn't work out we'll still be the marauders, you'll see._

_Stay un-prattish,_

_Sirius O. Black._

He dropped the letter onto his bedside table and curled up on the dust covered duvet. There was something so wrong with that letter. Like seventeen year old Sirius had expected for it to turn out so horribly right, when everything was so terribly wrong.

He didn't have tears like Remus because Sirius never cried. He hadn't cried since he was five when his mother first threw him in the cellar for lighting the curtains on fire. He hadn't cried over anyone but his own misfortunes since he was four and his pet fish had died.

Sirius just had an empty, black hole where his heart should have been, a gaping expanse that wasn't beating properly like it should have. He ached for Remus.

Remus plucked the letter off the bedside table and held it out of Sirius' reach, as if he expected Sirius to grab it and keep it from him. There was no point keeping it, there was nothing else he could do to make Remus lo...

...to make Remus act cordially towards him.

So he fixed his eyes on Remus' as he read, watching the hazel orbs skim over the lines, going back and forth and down to the next line.

As he read, Remus' head crinkled, he smirked, and he rolled his eyes. His breath hitched for a while and then exhaled forcefully, as if to breathe out Sirius. Then his eyes pricked on the sides as he coughed loudly to cover a sniff, and a great drop of liquid splattered all over the paper, running the ink and make Remus make some kind of noise, somewhat like an injured animal.

Of course Remus would be getting upset over running ink, it was _so_ Remus.

But he kept reading, even though the ink kept running, until he was so far down the bottom of the page that Sirius reasoned he must have been finished reading. However he kept his face concealed behind the paper until he had thoroughly attended to his eyes, which were now red raw from forcefully wiping them.

Remus then did something very un-Remus-y.

He socked Sirius, right in the stomach.

Sirius doubled over from his back to his side in pain, yelling in shock and gasping for breath due to being so unceremoniously winded. His eyes focused unsteadily on Remus' above him, backing away fearfully, his brain desperately trying to work out the situation. It was utter madness.

Remus had never hit anyone before. Not even Sirius when he had caused a minor issue with Snape, which may have involved him talking him into visiting the Whomping Willow and how to get past it, _maybe _when Remus might have been undergoing a transformation.

But now he stood above him, frustrated, hurt and confused and prepared himself to do it again.

Sirius was fairly quick when it came to beatings though, he was good at avoiding them and after Remus had smashed the bedpost and the bed stand and the chest of mahogany drawers did he stop.

Sirius of course had been protesting and yelling, attempting with little success to calm down Lupin, half confused and half bemused by this rapid change of events.

Remus felt numb. He felt his hands shaking, his fists were covered in blood (mostly his own due to his poor aim and Sirius' excellent ducking), and his heart racing a thousand miles an hour. He hated Sirius, he hated him so much, and he had to hurt like Remus hurt and feel how Remus felt because it just _wasn't fair._

'Moony?' Sirius queried, running his hands through his hair instinctively. It was a habit he had unfortunately picked up along the years of being so close to James, and losing James had only made it more frequent.

'Moony are you finished beating me and furniture up now, you crazy berk?' he asked, confusion lacing his voice.

Remus lifted his head out of his delirium and pounced on Sirius again, this time landing back on the bed, on top of his relatively unscathed victim, placing his hands either side of him as if to trap him under his own body weight.

'Goddamn it Sirius' he growled, shoving Sirius' shoulder back onto the bed forcefully as he attempted to weave out of his predicament.

'Ah! Merlin Moony! What is your problem?' he said, accusation dripping from his voice, 'as far as I can see here I've been nothing but a victim.'

'Fuck you Sirius' Remus snarled again, pushing him back down and baring his canine teeth, which, somewhat like Sirius' were a tad too long to be considered completely normal.

'What the hell...Moony!'

'I _hate_ you Sirius, I fucking hate you so much, why couldn't you just pretend I didn't exist either, and just leave me the _hell _alone!'

'I don't know Moony, maybe because I'll stay loyal to my friends, unlike some other people I know, and don't fucking leave them because suddenly they've decided they're just not worth their time.'

'You're not worth my time, you mean _nothing_ to me Sirius, nothing!'

'Then why did you bother coming up here Remus? To talk about your feelings with Nymphadora?'

'Shit Sirius I _like_ Tonks, she's perfect for me and I'm completely _happy_ without you,' Remus spat, feeling very much like a liar because nothing in this world was perfect, much less his attraction to Sirius' second cousin.

'Way to ruin it then Moony, perhaps you should just saunter back down my _fucking_ stairs, out of my _fucking_ house and get the _fuck_ out of here,' Sirius snapped, feeling his self control break.

'I wish I could, if I wasn't a _fucking_ werewolf then maybe I could find somewhere else with a completely concreted area which I can transform in.'

'Glad to know I'm of such _use_.'

'Fuck you.'

'Fuck off Moony, go find someone else to blame for your unhappiness.'

'I'M HAPPY!'

'Sure seems like it.'

'Fuck you!'

'Such a limited vocabulary.'

'At least I'm not limited to the confines of a house because I'm a convicted criminal for killing god knows how many muggles.'

'Are you convinced now? Wouldn't surprise me, you seemed to forget me very quickly when it first happened.'

'You called me the liar Sirius, would you be surprised if I believed them?' Remus snapped, hurt welling up in him, overcoming his anger.

'If you believe I am who they say I am then why are you here?'

'Because I had to remind myself that you're all wrong for me!'

'You needed convincing of that? You sounded so sure before Moony.'

'I am sure! I hate you Sirius, goddamn it I hate you!'

'Then why are you straddling me!'

'Fuck you!'

'If I repulse you so much why won't you get off me?'

'BECAUSE I DON'T WANT TO!'

Remus panted under the effort of trying to suppress his long bottled up anger. He had failed miserably. Months upon months of convincing himself that he wasn't attracted to Sirius, months of convincing himself that he loved Tonks, months of convincing himself that he was _straight_ had fallen away in the space of two minutes.

Remus was Sirius. Sirius was Remus. Nothing was going to change that in the slightest. Tonks couldn't change it, Remus couldn't change it, fuck it, Voldemort probably couldn't change it.

It was RemusSirius. It just was. Nothing else in the world was simple, especially not know, he reasoned. If there was one thing that would just for once work out, just happen correctly, be easy and lovely and feel so complete then _why on earth_ would he deny it.

'Fuck Sirius,' he whispered, only just audibly to the body beneath him.

Sirius melted into concern and worry, his anger was extinguished with Remus' collapse. After all, there was nothing more important in the world than Remus, even when he had given up on Sirius.

'Moony?' he whispered back, searching for some kind of recognition through the hazel orbs which glinted gold with the limited light that filtered through the dusty windows.

'Moony talk to me' he pleaded, digging away at Remus' defences until he heaved a sigh and tears ran down his nose, threading themselves either onto his cheeks or onto Sirius below.

Sirius pulled the wolf down gently so he flopped down beside Sirius on the bed, facing him. Sirius wasn't exactly sure what to do or where to start, if there was one thing he wasn't good at it was emotions.

All he really wanted to do was kiss Remus. Not just kiss but snog and touch and _ravish_ him until it made up for everything wrong Sirius had ever done. Ravish him until it made him feel better and less broken and less fragile. But Sirius wasn't sure Remus wanted him to and so he lay, facing him, bravely reaching out to touch his face.

Remus jolted when Sirius gently pushed his hair back off his face, and traced the tears down his cheeks, wiping them off softly as if to try and make it all better. He felt like he had betrayed himself so disgustingly when he let Sirius wriggle closer to him and throw his sinewy arm over his body, holding him closer and attempting to warm him up. Remus wasn't himself anymore, and he couldn't deny that he would ever be quite the same again.

On one hand it was Sirius' fault, on the other; no one could be _blamed_ for something so right.

'Moony' Sirius whispered again. God, he was so good at ruining the moment.

'Shut up Sirius' he whispered back, a little more harshly.

'Moony, I...' Sirius trailed off, running a finger down Remus' breastbone and settling his hand over his heart.

'Shut up goddamn it,' Remus sighed, but Sirius swore he could hear his mouth turning up in the corners.

'I never shut up Moony' he sighed, his mouth inverting into a light smirk, his eyes lightening.

'Sirius.'

'I never shut up Moooooooony' he smiled mischievously.

'Goddamn it Sirius, I love you.'

Remus froze, waiting for Sirius to hit him, or slap him, or scream at him for being so _stupid_. Or in the worst case scenario, laugh at him and drill him with the knowledge that Sirius could never _love_ Remus.

But he only smiled gently and whispered, 'that's not allowed Moony, it says so right here' he smiled, jabbing his finger at the line of his letter addressing such issues.

'Fuck it.' Remus whispered.

'Fuck it indeed.'

A comfortable silence ensued, in which both of them mulled over the enormity of the situation, the complexity of the world that encompassed them and the simplicity of RemusSirius.

'Is it okay that I love you?' he questioned softly, winding one of Sirius' grown curls around his finger.

'Utterly ridiculous.'

'You know that's not the answer I'm searching for Padfoot.'

'I bloody love you too you prat' Sirius smiled, and reached over to press his lips against Remus.

They met halfway, soft lips upon half scarred and forceful ones. The kiss wasn't gentle or loving. Nor was it sloppy, wet and understanding. Instead it was utterly hot and mind blowing, enveloping their bodies in some kind of spurring heat as they moved their lips against each other's firmly and passionately.

It was always this hot with Sirius, Remus thought. RemusSirius was never slow or loving or understanding, it was just steamy and fast and furious. This wasn't to say that Remus didn't care about Sirius, or that Sirius didn't care about Remus, but when it came to all things physical, they were just too impatient to even pretend to be soft.

It was something to do with being animals perhaps, Sirius thought, although his train of thought was cut off abruptly as Remus moved his hands down Sirius' torso and down to his pelvic bone, distracting him immediately.

Even as grown men, definitely over thirty, it would have been so irrational to deny themselves such teenage emotions, such teenage lust. They had missed young love, missed young passion, so in some way it was theirs now.

Remus would have agreed if he had been able to think rationally. But nothing else mattered to Remus than Sirius, nothing but RemusSirius. He didn't know what would happen tomorrow, what would happen the day after that or months after that or years after that. But even if Sirius were to die tomorrow, the next day, within the year, things would be just as sweet.

Sirius would always be with Remus.

Remus would always be with Sirius.

It would always be RemusSirius he rationalised. Nothing else would make any sense.

Then, Sirius' lips crashed down against his with such passion that his mind blanked, a hot tongue was in his mouth and rough skin was grinding against his, and Remus was complete.


End file.
